Questions about fair divorce settlement for home-schooling SAHM

[Grannycurls]

Good morning! My daughter is not on MN; I’ve been a member for many years but haven’t been active for a while. But I’m here again with a few questions.

My daughter and her husband are divorcing, and she has questions about money, living costs, and living arrangements.
She has two children, 5 and 8, and she is their full-time carer, and she also homeschools. She would like to continue this arrangement.
Her husband has built up a business over the past 4 years and it’s going quite well.

They are living in rental accomadation. He pays the rent in full. He’s away most of the day till their bedtime, and at home at weekends.

Her main question concerns financial assets. They have a joint account and he provides quite generously, but he also has a business account to which she has no access. How can she be assured of a fair settlement? She is not named in the business; how can the business assets be shared fairly?
They both want to avoid lawyer fees. What’s the cheapest way of going through with this? What is she entitled to? She does not expect 50-50 of whatever his business is valued at; what she would like is a house of her own for herself and the children. And of course ongoing support to continue to be at home full time for the children. The children are well adjusted; they understand that “Daddy will be leaving” and have taken it quite well.

The other concern is that she has asked him to move out, obviously so that she can continue at home with the kids with little disruption. He says she has to put this in writing. Is this advisable? What could be a secondary motive for this request?

I look forward to your opinions; thanks for any input. If you have questions, ask away.

You are being quite insulting to a lot of people!
Nobody needs to sacrifice their career with healthy, non-send children - what is needed is a couple sharing the load.
Many women choose to sacrifice their career , which is of course their right. but it is a choice

So your DD wants her STBEXH to pay her rent, bills and other expenses in full for the foreseeable future and, if he agrees to this which he would be mad to, she wants to keep costs down by having no legal agreement?

Insane. Even if he was staggeringly rich, I’d still think it seems like a disaster waiting to happen and I think you should be giving her better advice @Grannycurls. Can he truly, genuinely, afford to fund 2 separate households independently to anything approaching an adequate quality of life for the kids?

No, there isn't. These couples have family help, or they have paid help. I know myriad families, of different levels of wealth, and not a single one has 2 parents with flying careers without a lot of help. 100% of my friends in London either brought their mums from abroad to care for the children, or paid for help, or the women stopped working properly and opened "a consultancy" or "a business". It just can't be done. It's the same for everyone I've met in the four countries I've lived. (unless, of course, all of you are talking about careers that are not demanding at all...)

@whatwouldlilacerullodo weirdly enough, I’m in London as well. most people don’t have family help, and nobody gave up their career.
Of course we all use nursery, after school care etc, but that’s not unusual. no nannies etc, no mothers to help.
Some people are choosing the tradwife life, but it is a choice (disabilities excluded- children with disabilities change everything)

How does she plan on supporting herself?

That’s the point.

2 good careers can afford the help. Even two reasonable ones can afford it- generally a decent wage can afford a cleaner, after school care and holiday clubs.

there’s no reason a woman should stay at home full time to “support” her husband in his career, making herself financially vulnerable in the process.

courts see it the same ways. This is why spousal support is no longer a thing. It’s recognised that women have the choice to stay at home and a man does not need a “little woman” at home to support him.

Yer a wizard @SleeplessInWherever …

That is exactly what I had in mind when I typed it 😂😂

Me and my husband were v high earners . No family help , yes we paid nursery , but beyond that juggled pick ups/drop offs/holidays/ illness etc and did not have a cleaner or gardener or anything!

nonsense that it can’t be done. And 90% of couples I know are the same

The business needs valuing. Forensic accounts with expertise in the type of business are normally the ones who do that, but if it's small (e.g. a tradesman) then the company accountant might be enough (and less expensive). But your DD should probably ask for a copy of the accounts and get a second opinion herself. If it's more complex then a judge could have concerns about a company accountant valuation and not permit the settlement until someone more independent with more expertise values it - even if your DD and her ex agree.

(Edited - sorry for quoting the entire OP, didn't intend to)

So op and her daughter basically just say….
she doesn’t want to work and wants the soon to be ex to fund her life so..

What a load of rubbish. Me and DH both have very good, high earning careers. I've never had any family help, not even one hour of childcare from family.

Indeed. My husband and I plan our lives and finances as a team. We both made sacrifices to prioritise our children - we’d probably both be able to earn more, but we both want to be home for dinner, around for our kids (my daughter is autistic so still needs us a bit more than the typical teenager), and to share the responsibilities. We are immigrants, so no family anywhere, we don’t have a cleaner or anything but we pay for childcare during working hours. We both compressed to 4 days when we had our 2 children and each had a day home.

We are extremely lucky to have more flexibility post Covid with hybrid working, but our kids are 13 and 9 so we managed before this too. I had a full year maternity twice so I am a couple steps behind my husband financially, but if something happens to his health or his job or my marriage, I can handle most things myself. That’s super important to me and also to him.

All this to say I don’t think your daughter can divorce and expect no change to her life. It’s not sustainable or practical and almost certainly isn’t possible financially anyway. She needs to figure out how to be self sufficient.

She is entitled to 50% of the assets. There is no house to split which would be acceptable without question so I don’t see how splitting a business is any different.

it’s not really common for self employed businesses to be worth much though.

This. I don't think he's going to want to support 3 dependants from a house he can't live in.

So the business is dissolved and split… how does she plan to fund life going forward now the dh has no income stream?

What the business is worth is a separate question to how does he get that money without selling.

It doesn’t have to be dissolved and she’s not necessarily entitled to 50%. Usually Either she take an income or he buys her out.

@Itsmetheflamingo that’s not correct at all. She’s entitled to a fair share - which could be less than 50% of total pot. Or could be more. We have no way of knowing

but she’s certainly not automatically entitled to 50% of everything

My friend has just finalised her divorce it was more straightforward than your DD circumstances though the financial agreement was made more complicated than needs be. Her costs were 8k. My other friend has to go to court due to her ex being difficult and complex financial issues, it’s going to be 20k.

This.

His idealism of having wife & kids at home will soon disappear when he’s not benefitting from it.

She needs to start securing an income

That’s what I said above. 50:50 is a starting point.

@Itsmetheflamingo you said “she is entitled to 50% of the assets”. That is not true

Yes apologies that was misleading, she is entitled to an asset split for which 50:50 is the accepted starting point. As you can see, I clarified that in the post below 7 minutes later

Personally I'd suggest to your daughter to go to CAB as this is free, and maybe see if any lawyers do free initial consultation. Just to get some expert advice. But also this should not be disclosed to soon to be ex. The old adage knowledge is power, to be informed is to be prepared